I skimmed through a lengthy profile of Mickey Rourke in my favorite literary magazine, Maxim, and the writer mentioned Rourke’s upcoming projects, and Killshot was nowhere to be found.

Did I see this right, Rosario Dawson’s playing Donna? Hmm.

I finally finished the book the other day (I’m late to the game here)—Wow! I think it’s one of Dutch’s most unique books. Dark stuff.

Probably his second darkest book after Glitz, though I can’t say for sure ‘cause there’s still a few I’ve yet to read. But Killshot still had me cracking up during some passages. The humor’s never far away. Is Elmore Leonard the king of black comedy?

Did I see this right, Rosario Dawson’s playing Donna? Hmm.

It was the producer’s idea.  Arguably she is miscast.  She is a very lovely woman and did a fine job, but the logic behind the decision was flawed.

For what it is worth, I would rank Split Images as “darker” than Killshot based on the fact that Angelo Nolan gets unexpectedly whacked. Agree Glitz is darkest of all.

angela’s end is dark
so is gary hammond’s
out of sight
similar
killshot could be the darkest
no sunny days on the beach
no glitz at all
it is fun waiting for the film eh

From a recent Mickey Rourke interview…

What’s up with that movie “Killshot” [which co-stars Thomas Jane, Diane Lane and Rosario Dawson and has been sitting on the shelf awaiting release for two years]?
“I don’t know what’s going on with that. I think somehow they fucked up the ending. They hired an actor at the beginning who really sucked and they started cutting his part out. Then when they cut it out completely, the ending didn’t make any sense. So they ended up with their finger up their ass.”

Must be Johnny Knoxville who sucked.

How about a good sign for Killshot? Since it has been mentioned that Killshot’s fate is somewhat dependant on Mickey Rourke’s new movie The Wrestler, it seems by extension this qualifies.

Bill Simmons gives a very in-depth review of The Wrestler in ESPN The Magazine (and on their website) and says Rourke gives an Oscar-worthy performance. I honestly think this will help that movie as much as any “real” film critic’s praise, if not more so, because Simmons has an absolutely huge readership. So big he’s the only writer for whom they had to immediately disable blog comments for his articles because of sheer volume. I think he’s still the only one whose articles you can’t leave comments on.

Anyway, didn’t mean this to be a post about Simmons, I just hope Rourke gets some true Oscar talk. Because I like him and because I hope Killshot gets a wide theatrical release.

I can link the review, I just didn’t know if that’s kosher since it’s technically unrelated to Elmore Leonard.

bill_1through4 - 17 December 2008 05:19 PM

Bill Simmons gives a very in-depth review of The Wrestler in ESPN The Magazine (and on their website) and says Rourke gives an Oscar-worthy performance.

Yesterday the Toronto Film Critics Association named Mickey Rourke the Best Actor in 2008 for The Wrestler. It got a lot of buzz at the Toronto Film Festival.

bill_1through4 - 17 December 2008 05:19 PM

How about a good sign for Killshot? Since it has been mentioned that Killshot’s fate is somewhat dependant on Mickey Rourke’s new movie The Wrestler, it seems by extension this qualifies.

Bill Simmons gives a very in-depth review of The Wrestler in ESPN The Magazine (and on their website) and says Rourke gives an Oscar-worthy performance. I honestly think this will help that movie as much as any “real” film critic’s praise, if not more so, because Simmons has an absolutely huge readership. So big he’s the only writer for whom they had to immediately disable blog comments for his articles because of sheer volume. I think he’s still the only one whose articles you can’t leave comments on.

Anyway, didn’t mean this to be a post about Simmons, I just hope Rourke gets some true Oscar talk. Because I like him and because I hope Killshot gets a wide theatrical release.

I can link the review, I just didn’t know if that’s kosher since it’s technically unrelated to Elmore Leonard.

I still can’t understand how the guy has such a large following. He’s funny sometimes but he’s so pretentious the other half. Plus the guy only writes about the NBA and the Celtics. I know the guy is a Boston native but come on you write for a national website follow other teams.  I know the United States could care less about the NBA unless it’s the Celtics or the Lakers but mix it up some.

I am no Simmons devotee, but I have enjoyed many of his columns. Mostly I read his NFL columns. Even though he is of course an open Patriots fan, he does follow the rest of the league pretty closely.

What really surprises me is your pretentious comment. The reason I find him so readable is he seems entirely unpretentious to me. I get annoyed with a lot of sportswriters for the same reason I get annoyed with some novelists. They really seem to please themselves by displaying their ‘impressive’ vocabulary. And I can just picture them sitting there thinking, Okay, what’s the least common-language way I can express this idea (or even a single word)? And you get some convoluted sentence that you would never hear a normal person, or even the writer himself, say out loud in conversation. It just screams, “Look at me! Look how clever I can write!”

And it’s even worse coming from a sportswriter because, you know, it’s sports. Can we please take ourselves a little less seriously?

So to me, Simmons is the opposite of that. The way he writes is the way he talks sitting around with friends. He’ll never be on the writing level of Elmore Leonard (not comparable felds anyway), but I do think they have that in common. I consider them both to have a conversational style of writing.

bill_1through4 - 09 January 2009 01:43 PM

I get annoyed with a lot of sportswriters for the same reason I get annoyed with some novelists. They really seem to please themselves by displaying their ‘impressive’ vocabulary. .

Are you referring to columnists or general game stories?

In game stories, I don’t see many sportswriters showboating. 

I do some freelance sports writing on the side—nothing glamorous, mostly high school sports, though the Minnesota Vikings hold their training camp in my town, so I cover them for a couple weeks every year while I get to rub shoulders with the absolute cream of the national sporting press (sarcasm).

Most of them are self-absorbed geeks, and only a few of them do I admire as writers.

And to make matters worse, a lot of them don’t even like to drink afterwards and swap stories. What a drag. 

This reminds me of a passage at the end of Hunter Thompson’s Fear and Loathing on the Campaign Trail ‘72, and I can’t recall the exact quote, but he says a Thesaurus is a sportswriter’s best friend.

But I pride myself on a very unimpressive vocabulary.

And put me in the camp that can’t stand Simmons, but that’s mostly because I despise all things Boston sports.

As both a fan of film and Mr. L, I hate to say I will probably see this movie IF it’s ever made available, theaters or dvd. Even bootleg, I suppose.

But knowing the material on which this is based, and from the looks of that awful trailer along with the details of the changes made regarding location and Johnny K (they thought his character was obnoxious - well, so he was in the book, too, not ever character is supposed to be tolerable) I imagine this did not turn out well.

As for the Rourke cuts, well, the man is an actor, and a good one, but as for his personal behavior, got nothing to do with his job. Like, you know, going to a Clooney film regardless if the man drank Obama Kool-Aid, or to a Baldwin film even though the man broke his promise to leave the USA if Bush won.

I mean, one’s got nothing to do with the either.

Then again, maybe.

Right wing blather notwithstanding, back to the topic.

Haven’t heard anything from The Weinstein Company about the Killshot release, but filmColony reports that the film will be released in Phoenix in about 5 theatres on 1/23 as “a test”.

How did I miss this?  Looks like I have an assignment.  Any more details, like which theatres, etc.?

pbenjamin - 12 January 2009 07:48 PM

How did I miss this?  Looks like I have an assignment.  Any more details, like which theatres, etc.?

Phoenix? Why don’t they test this in Toronto where they made it?

well, have a good time, let us know what it’s like.

Road Dawg - 09 January 2009 05:31 PM

bill_1through4 - 09 January 2009 01:43 PM

I get annoyed with a lot of sportswriters for the same reason I get annoyed with some novelists. They really seem to please themselves by displaying their ‘impressive’ vocabulary. .

Are you referring to columnists or general game stories?

No, not game recaps or even later analysis-type columns (Dr. Z, etc.). I’m talking about opinion pieces and especially puff pieces—you know feel-good stories where they take the storyteller approach.

bill_1through4 - 13 January 2009 02:35 PM

Road Dawg - 09 January 2009 05:31 PM

bill_1through4 - 09 January 2009 01:43 PM

I get annoyed with a lot of sportswriters for the same reason I get annoyed with some novelists. They really seem to please themselves by displaying their ‘impressive’ vocabulary. .

Are you referring to columnists or general game stories?

No, not game recaps or even later analysis-type columns (Dr. Z, etc.). I’m talking about opinion pieces and especially puff pieces—you know feel-good stories where they take the storyteller approach.

Maybe the bad ones look even worse because the good sportswriters can be so good. I grew up in Montreal and in the early 70’s there were two really good sportswriters, Red Fisher and Dink Carroll. Later Michael Farber wrote some great stuff about the Expos until he moved on to Sports Illustrated and other US publications.

When I was a kid and a teenager I didn’t read many books but I read a lot of newspapers and sports magazines. I admit I haven’t read many recently, so maybe the quality has gone down. But I did always appreciate the straightforward and character-based approach of Fisher and Carroll and that’s probably one of the reasons I took to Elmore Leonard right away.